Good Choice, Poor Choice

We all make choices about plants in our landscape.  Some can be evaluated as good, some bad.  This is a subjective determination, but can be objective too.  These choices can also be well considered, or spur of the moment. This post is about two plants: both were spur of the moment, or fairly spontaneous, choices. One worked out well the other did not.

The photo on top is from what I like to call my "edible landscaping." This photo was taken in one of my front yard flower beds, yes, flower bed.  Ten years ago, I planted strawberries in my backyard vegetable garden. I tried hard to follow the spacing guidelines and, having ordered 50 plants, had 15 or so "leftover."  What to do?  Well, I was also working on my flower beds in front at the same time, and they were pretty sparse, so, the extra strawberry crowns got tucked in here and there among the flowers.

For years, both beds flourished, but, don't you know it, the beds in the vegetable garden faltered, while the flower bed strawberries, which have been pretty much ignored, took off,  and set lots of fruit.  Now, the flower bed berries are doing much better than those in the veg garden, and they make a nice, green ground cover all season long.  A serendipitous choice gone well.

The photo above is of a choice that has not gone so well and is a "morality play" about the potential problems with "passalong" plants (those plants given you by an enthusiastic gardener friend).  Most of the passalong plants I have been given are great: day lilies, iris, sedums.  But this one not so much.  The grassy foliage above is river oats. I was initially charmed by the cool, draping seed heads of this plant, sort of like draping oats or wheat, and for years I used it in flower arrangements.  But it grew and spread and, if I don't continue dig it out, my garden will consists of it and obedient plant, another passalong (luckily obedient plant is easy to pull).  We had a wet spring, thank goodness, which enabled me to remove almost all of the river oats, but do your research before you plant it!

So, we gardeners make good choices and bad ones, and have to deal with the consequences.  Hum, I guess that is like life in general!

Happy gardening!

Thank You, Neighbor!

Passalong Plants

Passalong plants

There is a fine, old tradition of passalong plants, that is, friends, family and neighbors giving you divisions or cutting of their plants. The iris pictured above was given to me by a neighbor with whom I often chat while on my daily walk. I had been admiring his light purple iris for years, and had never been able to find a good match for it. I asked him to save some for me if ever he divided them and, voila, he gave me three bags full that very year (and I shared some with friends)...and he threw in some dark purple iris as a bonus!
I have a few rules with passalong plants:
1. Look the plants over and discard any that show signs of disease or insect infestation (like iris borers, they leave an oozy trail in the rhizome-my neighbor's rhizomes were clean, but for extra insurance you can soak the rhizomes in a 10% bleach and water solution for an hour).
2. Know before you plant- I wish I had realized how invasive obedient plant can be before I planted a division from a friend- now it's rip it out all season long. Also, some plants should be certified disease-free, and your neighbor cannot do that for you (cane fruits, gooseberries/currants and potatoes come to mind)(and that brings up another related point-in some states certain plants are illegal, example, currants and gooseberries, because they harbor and transmit white pine disease- another reason to know before you plant).
3. And my own personal rule- accept everything you are offered (within reason)- if you reject it, people won't offer again. You can always give a (healthy, non-invasive) plant away or discard unhealthy, invasive ones!
(another lagniappe from my garden below)Happy gardening!